Description:

The Zend\Authentication component provides an API for authentication
and includes concrete authentication adapters for common use case
scenarios.

Zend\Authentication is concerned only with authentication and not with
authorization. Authentication is loosely defined as determining
whether an entity actually is what it purports to be (i.e.,
identification), based on some set of credentials. Authorization, the
process of deciding whether to allow an entity access to, or to
perform operations upon, other entities is outside the scope of
Zend\Authentication. For more information about authorization and
access control with Zend Framework, please see the
Zend\Permissions\Acl or Zend\Permissions\Rbac component.